Helping hands

At 2:45 pm it was all ok. People were going about their everyday lives. Contracts were being signed, washing was finishing a cycle to the sound of a daytime TV ‘wide show’ playing in the next room and the shop assistant was busily stocking the shelf with a brand new box of Kiri Mochi rice cakes.
In less than a minute life would be turned upside down...
We can go for days without speaking to a stranger preferring instead the conversation with a familiar face. It is easy for us to feel disconnected from the rest of the world....until this.
Even from 5996 miles away, the shockwaves of human despair can be felt beyond any measurable scale. And then something happens...Hands reach across an ocean and people stand to reveal compassionate, beating hearts. Suddenly the World becomes a much smaller place and we are reminded that we are all connected and we are all the same.
My love and thoughts go out to all those who have moved onto somewhere else and to those brave souls who remain.

“We must recognise that the suffering of one person or one nation is the suffering of humanity”
-The Dali Lama